Building Furniture
by dancingroundallalone
Summary: Drabble based on 'IKEA furniture' prompt.


**AN: I don't own the characters etc, etc**.

"Aw look, it's got cute drawings and everything," Blaine grinned, studying the first sheet of instructions and pointing at a cartoon figure holding a hammer. "He's got a sad face when he builds it alone, but a happy face when he builds it with a friend."

Kurt sighed, shaking his head at his over-enthusiastic boyfriend. "You've never done this before, have you?" he asked seriously, looking up from the arrangement of screws and various-sized slabs of wood that he'd laid out on the living room carpet.

Blaine's smile didn't falter. "No. Do I need to balance a pencil behind my ear like this guy?" he asked, pointing to the second figure on the page. "He looks like he knows what he's doing."

"If it makes you feel good," Kurt laughed. "But trust me, when we're finished with this, you are not going to be so willing to visit IKEA again."

"If it's that bad, why did you agree to do it?" Blaine asked, inspecting a small cellophane packet of metal screws.

"Because my dad would build a bonfire with these pieces before he built a chest of drawers," Kurt said seriously. He paused. "And I do not trust Finn with a screwdriver," he said ominously.

Blaine laughed. "I'm sure we can do a better job," he said. He reached over to take a blunt pencil from the coffee table and drew a tiny scarf on one of the cartoon figures, and a bowtie on the other. "See? They even look like us."

Kurt raised an eyebrow but couldn't help but return his boyfriend's eager smile.

Ten minutes later, Kurt's prediction was proving accurate.

"L two! What happened to L two?!" he exclaimed, his usually perfectly-styled hair growing limper with every exasperated tug resulting from his growing frustration.

"I thought we'd lost R two?" Blaine asked, equally confused. The spare pencil stuck out eccentrically from his loose curls and his cardigan was abandoned on the sofa behind him. "Or did we attach that to L one?"

"No, we attached R two to R one. That's the only thing we've done right so far," Kurt said, haphazardly lifting random pieces of wood and dropping them back on the carpet.

"Well don't mess up the piles," Blaine cried, snatching up a handful of unruly screws that had attempted to escape by rolling beneath the sofa. "We won't be able to find anything now!"

"We won't _need_ anything if we can't find L two," Kurt replied sharply. "And that bonfire is becoming rapidly more appealing."

"If your dad comes home and we're burning his new chest of drawers in the back yard, I don't think he's going to agree to letting us host that party here next weekend," Blaine said sternly, taking a plank of wood from the hands of his erratic boyfriend before it was snapped in half. "Let's just start again from the beginning."

Kurt groaned indelicately, before dragging himself to his feet. "I'm going to make coffee," he said stubbornly, heading off to the kitchen.

"Fine," Blaine said under his breath. He picked up a discarded piece of wood and miraculously matched it up with the piece on the diagram. "You must be L two," he said mockingly, turning back to the instruction sheet which had long since been crumpled and torn in their annoyance. "Why don't these things just come with words?" he asked no one.

Burt Hummel arrived home three hours later to find the couple lounging on the sofa, eating popcorn and paying little attention to the film playing on the tv in front of them. On the opposite side of the room was a fully-finished IKEA chest of drawers, on top of which lay a smoothed-out instruction sheet, two screwdrivers and a hammer.

"You finished it?" The amazement in his voice was unmissable. "And you didn't kill each other in the process?"

Kurt looked up at his father, his expression insulted. "You really thought that would happen?"

Burt's eyes flickered between Blaine and his son. "No," he admitted, honestly, walking over to the chest of drawers and running his hand over the top of it. "You did a good job," he added, impressed.

"It's really not as hard as everyone makes it out to be," Blaine said, ignoring his boyfriend's raised eyebrow.

"I guess not," Burt agreed. He patted the top of the newly built furniture once more, as if expecting the entire thing to fall apart beneath his hand. When it did nothing but cause the screwdrivers to roll into each other, he turned back to the kitchen.

"It's 'really not that hard'?" Kurt quoted, nudging Blaine's ribs with his elbow as soon as his father had left the room. "I don't remember hearing you say that to the guy on the phone."

Blaine smiled and looked down, blushing lightly.

"I can't believe you called the helpline," Kurt teased, tugging the pencil out from Blaine's curls.

"Just don't tell anyone," Blaine whispered, grinning with his eyes wide.

"Cheater," Kurt whispered back, using the recovered pencil to tap his boyfriend on the nose.

"I didn't see _you_ with any ideas," Blaine pouted. "But you were right," he paused. "I _never_ want to go to IKEA again."

Kurt laughed and kissed him lightly. "Good."


End file.
